ignite your bones
by PamelaTurpin
Summary: Artemis. Athena. Hestia. they all decided to go down the road of maidenhood forever, because love makes you take chances. it is unpredictable, unable to control. The daughters of Bellona and Atlas all took their chance, and failed. In the end, the only answer is in their blood, and it is war. Zoe/Reyna(Jason)/Calypso/Annabeth centered. AU.
1. back to square one

hi. so, let us begin.

**Summary: **because_ maybe, the daughters of bellona and the daughters of atlas are not so different._

* * *

love is blind. love is a lie. love is chaos. love is the thing that makes you run around in circles panicked, your head in the clouds and yet your heart staked into the ground. artemis. athena. hestia. they all decided to go down the road of maidenhood forever, because love makes you take chances. it is unpredictable, unable to control.

the daughters of bellona and atlas all took their chance. they failed, and the only answer is in their blood.

war.

* * *

Zoe Nightshade was one of many unknown heroines hidden behind centuries of Greek mythology. The layers all get jumbled up, and she is stuck between, forgotten and mistaken for just the cold princess of the Hunters. Yet underneath is a loving heart, and nobody ever thinks about _that,_ because people are ignorant and tend to forget the most important parts of legends, the string of the necklace.

She was the most beautiful of the Hesperides, and yet the most cold, for none of her sisters ever saw her as one of the girls. She didn't like dressing up. She didn't care for boys. She absolutely detested gossip, and also her sisters, who seemed to worship these three things. In her free time, she would go down to the tree and sit next to Ladon and hum a few long-forgotten melodies before falling asleep, but not completely. Only a fool would fall into deep sleep next to a highly poisonous and dangerous dragon.

Other times, she would sneak away from her sisters and go down into the woods. It was absolutely a magical place for her, what with all the unfamiliar plants and creatures and plain _adventure_, something you don't get a lot when you are a Hesperide. The flowers were beautiful and the lake was enchanting, but the best thing she loved about the woods was the little dryads that lived. They were much better company than her sisters, and they told her all kinds of things about the forest. She would then fall into cushions made out of leaves and just watch the birds fly by as the dryads chattered on.

One day - she never did count the days that flew by - she had heard a rustle from somewhere deep in the woods. If she was anybody else, she would probably have scampered off and ran away, but curiosity got the better of her, and she found herself walking towards the noise.

It was a bit far, and the sun was setting, but she had little fear of the dark nor the wild and kept on going. Her sisters wouldn't notice or care, anyways. "That weirdo's probably off to mate with the monkeys again," they would say. Or something even worse. Not that she really gave a damn.

Just when she thought she had lost track of the creature, a rough hand clamped over her mouth and she let out a surprised shriek before she was thrown onto the ground, someone breathing above her heavily.

She bit the hand.

"Ow!" the thing bit back a curse. "Gods, don't you have any manners?"

She finally allowed herself to open her eyes, and she saw a man, with a lion pelt and a purple toga underneath, slightly ripped at the knee. He had muscles of steel - she gulped - but looked kind enough, in the 'absolutely effing hot' way, as her sisters would have liked to describe it.

"I-I..." she looked up at him. It had been a long time since she had spoken to a real human being, or as much of a human as a half-Titan could be. "Who are you?"

He blinked, as if he found it surprising that there were people that didn't know his name. "Hercules, of course. Who did you think I am? Quiet down, pretty one, or you'll get us caught."

"If you think you could ever get caught in this place, you are much more ignorant than the Hercules I know of," she laughed, and it sounded like springtime. Just for a moment. "You do know where you are, o brave hero?" A smirk played on her lips.

"The Garden of the Hesperides, pretty one. And you never know when a god or goddess might be watching. They don't interfere in my quests, mostly because the gods don't give a shit anymore in the happenings in our little lifes." His grip tightened on her upper arm, and she felt shivers down her spine. "It's getting dark. Think you might be able to lead me nearer to the garden?"

She shrugged. "But you do not know who I am yet."

"Unless I've gone crazy, you must be one of the five sisters, but I thought they were much more chatty and flirty."

"I agree. I have broken the tradition."

"And that's a bad thing?"

"Not really." She started the route back to the Garden. "If you do not wish to be stranded in this forest, follow me."

* * *

"This is dangerous for you, pretty one. You might be banished from here."

His eyes seemed to change colour in the afternoon sunlight, shining wickedly, but his words slipped so smoothly from his tongue.

"I will handle that, but you must take care near Ladon. One bite, and your life shall slip away." She removed a pin from her hair with her skillful fingers. It was set with a single pearl, and it glistened brightly, matching the shine in her dark eyes. "Take this, hero. Follow my plan. You shall be able to get the apple if you follow all of the instructions carefully." She stares at the dirt ground. "I hope this is worth this."

He captures one of her hands in both of his. "I promise, Zoe. I shall not let you down."

Funny how the heros always seem to make promises they can never keep.

* * *

A/N: Yes, yes, thank you for reading this fic. It isn't finished (no duh), and I'll be focusing on the four female characters in the series I love best - Reyna, Zoe, Calypso, Hylla, and in the end, Annabeth. Revolved around the backstabbing men in the series, and some not in the books, lol.

REVIEW. Or I won't do the Jeyna *pouts* and I've gotten quite good at them, I promise.


	2. swallowed in the sea

**A/N: finally succumbed to jeyna. 'tis too powerful for me to resist. So, yeah, doing Jeyna. gosh, my arms hurt. jumping rope at school, and you have to jump for 12 minutes . japanese teachers must be idiots. enjoy? and review. oh yeah. *hand thrust movements***

* * *

_And then I looked up at the sun_  
_And I could see_  
_Oh, the way that gravity pulls on you and me_  
_And then I looked up at the sky_  
_And saw the sun_  
_And the way that gravity pushes on everyone_  
_On everyone_

_And if you ever feel neglected,_  
_If you think all is lost,_  
_I'll be counting up my demons, yeah,_  
_Hoping everything's not lost._  
_When you thought that it was over,_  
_You could feel it all around,_  
_Everybody's out to get you,_  
_Don't you let it drag you down._

* * *

they say that you should never count what is lost, but what is found. it's one of those sayings that our mothers say to us, and we remind them of after, when they're moaning about this and that. after a long time, it becomes a clever remark; something that nobody really cares for anymore.

reyna never knew how painful it would be to have him and lose him all over again. and she doesn't think she can remind herself of that saying again.

she doesn't think she has anything now.

* * *

Love has eaten her up.

for all her life, she has lost to Love bitterly. It has twisted and turned her mind around and left it so messed up she can't figure out which is right and which is wrong, and she can only bite her lip and try to bear through it, because that is what a war of Bellona should do. she can only chide herself that she has done nothing wrong; that fate had ordained for all of this to happen, because she has strived for happiness all her life to the limit. she is not a special demigod, nor especially powerful. she is not audacious, and she is never considered herself to be so. being a daughter of warfare did not allow her to win all her battles, physically and emotionally.

when she was only thirteen, she had lost everything she had known of - her possessions, her home, her safety, and most importantly, her sister.

Hylla had made her choice, and she made hers. there had been a fork in the road, and it turned out that her sister didn't love her enough to take the same route. she had assailed her sister, and done everything in her power to keep her by her side, but Hylla had taken her words with a grain of salt and ignored her begging.

Reyna didn't look back.

* * *

four years later, she is sitting on the throne of camp jupiter - holding the whole camp's respect, decked in a purple toga with the whole camp on her shoulders and a crown of pressure resting on her head. she sustained the whole population with her decisions, and it was not forgotten by all who were living under her umbrella.

she had everything, but inside, she was as hollow as could be.

on that bright quiescent afternoon, her eyes had met those of a radiant boy, with sky blue eyes and incandescent blonde hair, and her heart seemed to feel something; that of love and that of distaste.

either way, it was the first time in ages that she had felt anything deep down for anybody, and it made her feel flushed.

* * *

He becomes a praetor, side by side with her, and it becomes the first time she gets a chance to truly know about him.

up till that point, she had known what all the other campers had known about him - that he was quite tall (rumours were that he was 6'1), could beat anyone when it came to swordfighting, was possibly the most powerful demigod in the legion, and extremely "hot". the last one, she told herself, was only an opinion (stated by the Venus girls, no less), and that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. but she couldn't fool herself.

he was beautiful.

"Octavius is really annoying, isn't he?"

oh, right, she was talking to him. she bit the insides of her mouth.

"Oh gods, thank you for saying that. I've probably hated him ever since I stepped into this camp," she said. "Possibly because he called me a Greek during the first week."

He laughed, and it sounded like tinkling bells for some strange reason. "I can't imagine you acting like a _Greek, _out of all things. You're probably one of the most Roman demigods I've ever met. That just goes to show how ignorant of others he is."

"Yes," she agreed, and their eyes met. "It does. But I'd rather we stop this conversation about him now - I might spill sick over the floor from even thinking about him."

The corners of his mouth turned upwards, smiling at her. She suddenly felt the urge to run away in embarrassment. Not very praetor-like.

She should be used to all of this now. He had already been praetor for almost a month now, and they've almost spent everyday together, whether it was going over papers at the café or crashing out on the sofa after hours of work. She's ignored the dirty looks from the Venus girls, as if she had stolen away their god, and also the little comments from Jason's friends about their relationship.

"We're friends," they repeated over and over again. after a while, the statement becomes overused and meaningless, and not enough.

"Want to come over to my house for movie night? We could watch Get Smart for the seventh time -"

she shot him a glare.

"or, we could watch Twilight and badmouth it," he finished, grinning.

* * *

after hours of Edward/Bella fluff and just general cheese throughout the movies, they finally succumbed to their tired minds and passed out on the couch.

"how do you feel, being a praetor?" she asked nonchalantly.

he shrugged and thought for a moment. "if it means no curfew and dishwashing, it's good enough for me."

"gods, seriously."

he paused. "it's much better than I thought it would be. the duties are boring, but you finally get the feeling you're making a change in the world - if you understand what I mean. and...you're great. I thought you were a cold beauty, just a cold beauty, but now -"

"same on my part," Reyna said. "you're much more than I thought you would be. and -"

nothing said out loud had been exactly motivating, and there was nothing special about the moment - just two _friends_ sprawled out on the couch. but suddenly, his lips had covered hers, and the room suddenly felt much warmer, and he swears he can hear her heart pound hard against her chest, and she's absolutely lost, and -

* * *

half a year later, he's lost.

and her heart shatters, and she can literally feel all of those little pieces spiking her every move. she's been bested by Love so many times now that she thought peace was given to her at last, before it happened and it's too late and she can't take anything back. she can only try to reform her heart again on her own, but it doesn't really seem possible.

this is her wrath, and maybe Octavian was right - only Greeks fall at the hands of Love.

* * *

_but it's only when all is lost and hope lost from your grasp, that you realize the only thing left is love._

* * *

**liked it? I dunno, it was okay, in my opinion. The lyrics at the beginning are taken from Coldplay songs. **

**I'll probably do jeyna again in this series - it's way too tempting. Reviews appreciated! (: **


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